Newswise — Cambridge, MA: On Monday, February 4, 2013, JoVE (Journal of Visualized Experiments) will launch the first scholarly scientific video publication for chemistry. Following its successful introduction of video publications for the biological and physical sciences, JoVE received numerous requests for a chemistry counterpart. In response, the journal is launching a new section, JoVE Chemistry, dedicated to visualized publication of experiments across different areas of chemistry research including organic chemistry, chemical biology, electrochemistry, and polymer chemistry, among others.

"Similar to research in biology and physics, experimental research in chemistry suffers from a lack of reproducibility that can be solved by visualized publication. Therefore, it is natural to expand JoVE's novel publication approach to chemistry as well", says Moshe Pritsker, the CEO and co-founder of JoVE.

The debut article in JoVE Chemistry features a novel experimental approach to investigate antifreeze proteins using a device known as the nanoliter osmometer. This video article was filmed at the laboratory of Dr. Ido Braslavsky at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in Israel. Explaining the function of antifreeze proteins, Dr. Braslavsky says: "When an antifreeze protein binds to an ice crystal, the protein inhibits growth of ice and lowers the freezing point. This creates a difference between the melting and freezing point of ice known as thermal hysteresis."

By studying the properties of ice-binding proteins and thermal hysteresis, scientists gain insight into how arctic organisms can survive freezing temperatures without cellular destruction. Ice binding proteins are already used in hypothermia therapy, cryosurgery, the making of low-fat ice cream, and the lengthening of shelf life in frozen foods.

Dr. Braslavsky tells us, "I am studying the potential for antifreeze proteins to be used in cryopreservation. If we can learn from nature how to avoid freezing or survive freezing better, we can use these strategies to preserve tissue and organs for the improvement of our own lives." He also explains that, "chemistry is highly visual, and contains a lot of microscopy that can visualize dynamic processes. By putting these aspects of chemistry in the forefront of publication and demonstrating the experimental steps, JoVE will become invaluable to chemists and make hard-to-learn techniques reproducible."

"JoVE pays tribute to the central science with the opening of the newest section, JoVE Chemistry," says Alexa Meehan, the JoVE's Deputy Editorial Director. "This highly anticipated addition will facilitate the experimental research in one of the purest sciences and will further a transition of JoVE from a biological journal into a platform video journal for all scientific disciplines."